


Father and Son

by she_is_destroyer_of_worlds



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - Thorne & Rowling
Genre: Dark Mark (Harry Potter), Death Eaters, Draco Malfoy is Trying to be a Good Dad, Minor Astoria Greengrass/Draco Malfoy, POV Draco Malfoy, Post-Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Redeemed Draco Malfoy, scorpius loves his dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:34:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23616046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/she_is_destroyer_of_worlds/pseuds/she_is_destroyer_of_worlds
Summary: Just before Scorpius returns to Hogwarts for his 5th year, still haunted by the events of the previous year, he sits down to talk to his father about a long overdue subject: his dad's Dark Mark.
Relationships: Astoria Greengrass/Draco Malfoy, Draco Malfoy & Scorpius Malfoy
Comments: 2
Kudos: 74





	Father and Son

It was a week before Scorpius was to go back to Hogwarts for his 5th year when Draco peered over his copy of the Daily Prophet to see his son standing across the room looking at him, his hands resting on the back of one of the armchairs in the sitting room. Scorpius wore a sweater in Slytherin colors that was just slightly too big for him and a pair of flannel pajama pants, and it seemed that he’d just woken up. His features were soft in the early morning light.

“Is everything alright, Scorpius?” he asked.  
Scorpius’s eyes darted everywhere but towards his father. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he began, before his brow furrowed and he continued, finally looking at Draco, “well, not fine. More nightmares. About last year. And I’ve just been, thinking, about a lot of that stuff and, well, other things, and-” he paused again, sighing deeply.

“What is it?” Draco asked, hoping to coax an answer out of him.

“I er, wanted to ask you about…”

Between the hesitation in his son’s voice and the way his eyes darted towards Draco’s forearm, Draco knew where the question was headed. He sighed knowingly, closing the paper and placing it beside him on the couch.

“Why don’t you take a seat,” he offered, gesturing towards one of the armchairs across from him. Scorpius settled into the one in front of him.

Draco took a deep breath and rolled up his sleeve, revealing the Dark Mark that remained etched into his skin. Scorpius’s eyes went wide at the sight of it.

“You want to talk about this, don’t you?” Draco said quietly.

Scorpius looked up at his dad and nodded. “Yeah,” he replied, equally quiet.

Scorpius had always had vague notions of his father’s past, but he’d never pried. He’d asked his mother once, when he was younger, about the tattoo and about some of the other things he’d heard whispered around the halls of Hogwarts. She’d told him the basics, but left the details for Draco to tell one day. “That’s your father’s burden to bear and his story to tell, darling,” she’d said. “And when you both are ready, that’s a conversation or two waiting to be had.” But Scorpius woke up nightly in terror as he dreamt of that reality where Death Eaters walked free and where Voldemort had been in control. It had been one thing to see his father’s Dark Mark when it felt like a distant relic of a time before him, but now he knew what it really was and he knew the fear that came with it. Scorpius was ready now to hear what Draco had to say.

He cleared his throat and nervously fidgeted in his seat, still looking at Draco, who looked equally as nervous.

“Well, er, what do you want to know?” Draco asked, who despite having anticipated this conversation, still found himself terrified to speak.  
“So you were 16 when you got that?” Scorpius asked, gesturing towards the Mark.  
“Yes. I got it in the summer before my 6th year at Hogwarts.”  
“Were you scared?”  
If Draco closed his eyes, he knew he’d be right back in that moment, a newly turned 16 year old trying to look brave in front of a bunch of Dark Wizards who would have murdered him without a second thought if they’d wanted to. His arm had shook as Voldemort laid his wand to it, while Draco tried not to think about how many people had been killed with that wand, including Harry’s parents. He looked up and met Scorpius’s eyes.  
“I was terrified,” he said softly. “Of course at the time I tried to brush it off to my friends. I bragged about it. About being part of them, and being given tasks directly from… him. But honestly I thought he was going to kill me.”  
“And what did your parents do?”  
“My father had just been thrown in Azkaban, which was partly why I’d been picked out to replace him, to punish him for failing. My mother was furious, but she also wanted me to stay alive, and so she kept her head down and stayed quiet. But she did what she could in other ways to keep an eye on me and keep me safe.”

Scorpius nodded his head in understanding, before cautiously asking his next question. “When you were part of them, did you… Did you have to kill anyone?”  
Draco flashed back to that 6th year. He thought about all the almost-deaths he’d caused. Katie Bell, cursed and in St. Mungo’s for months. Ron Weasley, almost dead by poisoned mead. He’d had frequent panic attacks in the bathroom over the very question of murdering someone. He thought of Dumbledore, staring up at him in those half-moon spectacles of his, his life in Draco’s hands. His trembling hands that had been unable to make that final spell. And there Dumbledore was, speaking to Draco of his soul, talking to him like he deserved pity and not scorn. He’d been so angry then, at Dumbledore, at Snape, at Voldemort, that it had taken many years for gratitude to creep in. Gratitude towards Dumbledore, for looking at him like a human being and not a monster, and for Snape, doing what Draco could not, and in turn saving his life because of it. But now he turned back to Scorpius, trying to figure out how to tell any of this to his son.  
“I never directly killed anyone, but I saw a lot of death. I was the one who was ordered to kill Albus Dumbledore my 6th year. Snape did instead, but I still felt guilty about it. I was tortured by it for a long time. But I was also scared that if I didn’t do what I’d been ordered, that I’d be killed for it. I knew he’d do that if he wanted.”  
Scorpius’s eyes were wide, but to Draco’s surprise and relief, he didn’t press further.  
“Oh, wow,” Scorpius said quietly. He looked down at his hands, which he’d mostly hidden within the sleeves of the sweater. When he spoke again, he was even quieter. “What was he like? V- Voldemort, I mean.”

He tried not to think of Voldemort these days; his waking self had seen far too much of the dark wizard, but at his son’s question, he conjured up an image of him in his mind. Just the thought of him sent chills down Draco’s spine and he shuddered involuntarily.  
“I don’t know if I have the words to describe him. Any room he entered always seemed to feel colder. His glance alone felt like it could kill. For a man who’d bided his time patiently to return, he angered quickly and was always willing to punish those he felt to have failed him. He always had a mix of terror and power about him. But if you knew you were on his good side, he made you feel invincible.”  
“And did you...support him?” Scorpius asked meekly.  
Draco sighed and glanced out the windows of the sitting room, before turning back to his son. “I supported him more than I’m often willing to admit to myself. Or at least, I had believed in what he stood for. The things he said about muggle-borns and about his vision for a new wizard world. I’d grown up on that sort of thing; I didn’t know any different. But being a Death Eater first hand was something very different. Before long I stayed silent not because I always agreed, but because I wanted to survive. Especially during the war.”  
He’d seen a lot of horrid things that year, the kind that stayed with him even now. People killed, people tortured. He could still hear Hermione’s screams in particular, echoing through Malfoy Manor from her torture at the hand of his aunt. Sometimes he was still shocked that she was willing to still look him in the eyes. He was shocked Harry and Ron could stay mostly civil with him as well.  
“I had a lot of growing up to do after the war. A lot of processing and thinking and listening to do. The boy I was in those years was a very broken one and a very lost one. I worked hard to overcome that. But it doesn’t erase everything that happened. I still have to live with all of that.”  
Draco looked down at his hands, his fingers fidgeting with his wedding ring. Looking at it made his heart ache. He peered up a Scorpius, who was staring at him nervously. He may have inherited much of his appearance from Draco, but there was something about him that reminded Draco of Astoria as well. He cleared his throat, trying to speak again.  
“Your mum was so kind to me, when we first met and when we first started dating. She gave me room to heal and room to grow. And she was always willing to look at the man I was trying to become and not just at the boy I’d been.”  
He could feel the tears coming to his eyes and he did his best to wipe them away. He could tell that Scorpius was crying, though trying not to be obvious about it.  
“Yeah, that sounds like Mum,” he sniffled.  
They sat in the quiet of the room, both thinking about Astoria, before Draco broke the silence.  
“I was really scared to be your dad. I still am sometimes,” he admitted. “Scared that I won’t do a good enough job, especially on my own.”  
“I think you’ve done a fine job,” Scorpius interrupted earnestly.  
Draco couldn’t help but smile. “Thanks,” he said. “I just, well… My father was never the best role model for this sort of thing. He’d been a loyal follower of Lord Voldemort since the beginning and had always made his loyalties clear. I grew up in a house with a lot of secrets and darkness. And here I am now, trying to do better, yet with a Dark Mark branded to me just like it was to my father, terrified of what my son must think of me.”  
Scorpius got up and sat beside Draco, moving the copy of the Prophet onto the floor. “I don’t think you’re a bad person, Dad,” he said gently. “And besides, if you got through all that, I think you can survive me, even though I make it hard sometimes.”  
Draco pulled Scorpius in for a hug and held him tight, allowing for sincerity to slip through his usual reserved facade. “Being your dad has been my greatest achievement, Scorpius,” he whispered. “And you make Mum and I proud everyday.”  
Then he sat back, settling back into his usual demeanor and turned to Scorpius, who was still smiling up at his dad. “Alright then,” he said, “why don’t you go get dressed and we can take a trip to Diagon Alley and finish up your school shopping together.”  
“Okay, Dad,” Scorpius answered with a grin, hurrying off the couch and back upstairs.  
Draco’s gaze lingered on the empty doorway, thinking about the boy that Scorpius had become, the boy that he and Astoria had raised. He was far different from that boy Draco had been, far better and kinder and gentler than Draco had ever thought possible for himself at that age. Alone, he took a last glance at the Dark Mark on his arm before he rolled down his sleeve again to cover it, grateful for the chance to grow beyond his own teenage self and excited to watch his son continue to mature in this tumultuous world they lived in.


End file.
